Day in and day out, the compassion and kindness nurses provide to their patients is immeasurable.
This year, Alaskans nominated registered nurses and nurse practitioners in Alaska who have made a positive impact in the lives of patients, families and communities.
For our second annual Celebrating Nurses Awards we considered over 150 nominees.
The selection committee was made up of Alaska State Hospital and Nursing Home Association (ASHNHA) Communications Director, Jann Mylet; Alaska Journal of Commerce Sales Manager, Jada Nowling; Peak 2 Peak Operations Manager, Kerri Donnelly; and Peak 2 Peak Community Director, Brandi Nelson.
Anna Lee Hoover Registered Nurse Alaska Regional Hospital
Anna is an RNC at Alaska Regional Hospital in Anchorage. She is a highly-skilled career professional with more than 30 years of labor and delivery experience. She has worked over the last 30 years in Level 1, Level 2 and Level 3 labor and delivery units. Anna has worked in Washington, D.C., Ohio, Navajo reservation in Chinle, Ariz., and has lived and worked in Anchorage since 1997. Anna has enjoyed her career throughout such a variety of places and customs. She has put together classes and taught over the years, and put together OB stat drills for labor and delivery. She is very happy to be nominated for such an award.
Ansley K. Carter
CRNA, MSN, BSN, ASN
Alaska Native Medical Center
Raised in Tennessee, Ansley moved to Anchorage in 2006, following her family, and has been working as a full time CRNA for the Alaska Native Medical Center ever since. Prior to Alaska, she was a CRNA in both Colorado and Tennessee, but quickly fell in love with Alaska and the people that she has worked with over the years. Ansley started as the baby of the anesthesia department and now is one of the “seniors,” with only two CRNAs having been there longer. She is blessed to love her chosen career, and is honored to have been nominated for this award.
Arran Forbes Registered Nurse Alaska Regional Emergency Room
Ashten Glaves Registered Nurse
Anchorage Correctional Complex
Eagle River has been Ashten’s home since the age of six. She graduated with her nursing degree from UAA in 2010, and joined the Department of Corrections in December 2010. Ashten took a short break from the DOC and worked in the local hospital when she moved to Yakima Washington, while her husband went back to school. It was during her time out of state that Ashten realized how much she loved working as a nurse in corrections. She serves in a unique capacity with a population of patients who rarely have someone else fighting in their corner. Advocating and showing herself as trustworthy to her patients, while also helping patients realize that they can and need to own and take responsibility for their health and well-being, is Ashten’s goal every time she is on the clock.
Autumn Muse
BSN, RN Clinical Program Specialist Bartlett Regional Hospital
Autumn Muse is a registered nurse and has been in healthcare for almost 14 years. She earned her bachelor’s in nursing at UAA. After graduating, she spent five years of her career in Anchorage working in the hospital setting where she was known for making sure her patients received the highest level of care and compassion. She then moved back home to Southeast Alaska, where she practiced as a Public Health Nurse for five years and now works as a RN Clinical Program Specialist at Bartlett Regional Hospital. She continues to have a passion for providing the highest level of care to her community and is focused on ensuring that patients have positive hospital experiences. In her spare time, she enjoys spending time with her husband and two sons and getting outdoors.
Cara Shelton Dialysis Coordinator, RN, BSN Alaska Regional Hospital
Cara has been in nursing since 2008, working in Critical Care and Dialysis. Originally from Oklahoma, she was a travel nurse in California before making her way to Alaska in 2011. What started as a 13-week travel assignment has turned into a life here in Alaska after finding the right people, city, hobbies and job. On the job she enjoys working with the incredible dialysis nurses and hospital interdisciplinary team as they continue to grow and improve the dialysis program. In her spare time, Cara enjoys yoga, live music, destination concerts, hiking, camping and paddleboarding.
Carmen L. Pell
BSN, RN, NCSN Palmer High School
Carmen has been truly blessed to be able to work with the amazing students and staff at Palmer High as their school nurse for the past 25 years. Before that, she worked at the Palmer Senior Center at the Adult Day Center and as a Home Health nurse. Carmen is a homegrown Alaskan, growing up in Wasilla and graduating from the UAA School of Nursing. Carmen and her husband have three wonderful children: Amber, Elijah and Carson. Together they enjoy all things faith, family and outdoors.
Carol Miller Histand RN, SANE, recently retired Providence Forensic Nursing Services
Carol’s nursing career began in Northern Indiana after graduation in 1970 from Goshen College with a BSN, followed by employment in hospital work and psychiatric nursing. Travel to Alaska in 1977 brought work in hospital and office nursing in Soldotna as “travel” turned into a relocation. In 1989, she began work as a Public Health Nurse out of the Kenai office, primarily providing newborn home visits and general immunizations for 15 years. In 2004, Carol retired to relocate to Indiana and care for her parents in their last years, dealing with her father’s stroke aftereffects and mother’s dementia. In 2015, Carol came back to Alaska and reinstated her Alaska RN licensure to practice as a Forensic Nurse until her recent retirement in the midst of medical treatment.
Chrissy Fulcher
RN, BSN Alaska Women’s Cancer Care
Chrissy was born and raised in Valdez. She moved to Anchorage in 2007, to pursue her nursing degree, and graduated from UAA in 2011. A majority of Chrissy’s career has been spent working in women’s health and oncology. Working in gynecologic oncology has been rewarding, and she is happy to have found her passion. Currently, Chrissy is pursuing her nurse practitioner degree and looks forward to advancing her career.
Christine Cothran
RN, BSN
Providence Alaska Medical Center
Christine was raised in Alaska since 1972, and attended Dimond High School and graduated from UAA Nursing School in 1988. She started working at Providence on the medical oncology unit and found how much she loved caring for oncology patients and their families; that was 34 years ago and she hasn’t left. Christine has been married to her husband for 34 years, who also works at Providence, and has a son who works ICU at Providence, and a daughter who is a MA at a pediatric clinic.
Clay Adam Flight Nurse Lifemed Alaska
Clay has been a registered nurse for more than 30 years. He earned his bachelor’s degree in nursing from the University of St. Thomas in Houston, Texas, and subsequently a masters in nursing from the University of Texas Health Science Center, San Antonio as a critical care clinical nurse specialist. Throughout his career, Clay has worked in a variety of settings, including intensive care, emergency centers, flight nursing and pharmaceutical research, always focused on the health of the community. Moving to Cooper Landing in 2019, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, he coordinated local vaccine clinics, providing vaccines to more than 600 community members.Clay enjoys working with local seniors and is also the deputy chief of EMS in Cooper Landing. Returning to his passion, Clay recently joined LifeMed Alaska as a flight nurse, transporting critically ill and injured Alaskans throughout the state.
Cynthia Booher Director of Nursing for Providence Extended Care
Dr. Cynthia D. Booher was born in Long Island, New York, and moved to Kernersville, North Carolina, at the age of 16. She graduated from the University of North Carolina at Asheville, Winston Salem State University and the University of Phoenix - twice. Her career has had many facets: neurological ICU, hospice, education, school nursing and now, administration. Her passion for nursing is education and preparing the next generation of expert nurses. She moved to Alaska in 2015 with her family and enjoys the pleasures of the state immensely. She has been married to her nurse husband for 22-plus years, and they have a son, two dogs, three cats and two geckos.
Kelly Linebarger
ICU Clinical Nurse Coordinator/ Charge Nurse Alaska Regional Hospital
Kelly has lived in Alaska for 20 years. She started her nursing career in Adult Intensive Care in Northern California, and moved to Alaska in 2003 to work in the ICU at Alaska Regional and start flying with their hospital based medevac program. Kelly moved into full-time flight with AeroMed and LifeMed for the next 15 years, and found her way back to the Intensive Care bedside during COVID-19. Life outside the hospital consists of helping people find healthier lives through her business, CrossFit Alaska, biking, long-distance hiking, skiing, snowmachining and anything her dog enjoys!
Kim A. Greer RN Case Manager
South Peninsula Hospital Homer Alaska
Kim departed Swedish Medical Center in 1985, after three years in Neurotrauma as a Transport Orderly, Unit Clerk and LPN while advancing to RN. She worked two years in Abdominal and Thoracic Surgery as an RN, then traveled to Alaska and began work at SPH once she arrived. Kim spent almost 40 years as a Generalist, working in L&D, ACU, PACU and ER/ICU, was an education coordinator for 8-9 years, and then went back to clinical in 1999. She became Director of 78 employees in those departments from late 2017 until mid-2019, and then moved to Home Health. She has loved every moment of caring for people, patients and staff! It has been a great adventure throughout and she is still engaged in it, happily!
Mary Ursin Registered Nurse, Prenatal and Mother Baby Providence Alaska Children’s Hospital
Mary has been a registered nurse since 1986, when she graduated from the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio. She has worked in many different areas in nursing, in the hospital setting, outpatient education and home IV infusion, but for most of her career she has been focused on women’s health. This focus has spanned from labor and delivery, to patient education, nursing education and now mother baby and prenatal care. Mary has loved every minute of it, and feels privileged to be a part of many, many new beginnings.
